Resources and Potentials for development of the province

1. Natural resources:

* Land: Lao Cai has a natural area of ​​6,383.88 km2, high fertility, very fertile and diversified, including 10 groups of land with 30 main types of soils, which are very suitable for many different crops/plants. Of which: agricultural production land is 135,527.45ha, forest land of 358747.69ha, specialized land of 17,975.66 ha, and the residential land of 4,888.66ha.

* Water: The dense river system is distributed evenly across the province with two large rivers flowing through the province namely the Red River and Chay River, which originates from China and other thousands of large and small rivers and streams, which is a good condition for Lao Cai to develop small and medium hydropower projects. In the province, there are four mineral water sources, hot water with a temperature of 40oC and super-fresh water in Sa Pa district, which has not yet been exploited and used.

* Forest: There are 51,905 m3 of timber in the whole province (225 m3 of natural forest, 51,680 m3 of planted timber, 15,580 m3 of paper wood); 1,196,000 bamboo of all kinds. The planned area for the forestry land is 358,747.69 ha, accounting for 56.2% of the total natural area of ​​the province.

Hoang Lien National Park (Sa Pa) is rich in natural ecosystems (there are 2,024 species of plants belonging to 200 families, including 66 species in the Red Book of Vietnam, 32 species of rare species, 11 endangered species such as Calocedrus macrolepis; tsuga dumosa; pines; conifers, etc. There are 66 mammal species including 16 species listed in the Vietnam Red Book such as Birds, mammals, reptiles, many species rare and precious plant and animal species, treasures of rare plant genetic resources that is accounted for 50% of rare species of Vietnam.

* Minerals: Lao Cai is one of the richest mineral resources provinces in Vietnam with 35 different minerals and over 150 mines. There are many kinds of minerals such as apatite, copper, iron, graphite, materials for ceramics, porcelain, glass ... with the largest reserves in the country. Some large mines are easy to be exploited, easy to be transported and have international markets that facilitates the development of the local mineral processing industries.

2. Economic potentials

* Industrial potential: 

- Lao Cai is rich in mineral resources with more than 35 different typess of minerals and 150 valuable mines, including many kinds of high quality and large reserves. There are apatite with 2.1 to 2.5 billion tons, iron with 137 million tons, copper, gold, graphite, rare earth, feldspar, ceramic materials, glass porcelain, etc.

- Many kinds of minerals have beeng exploited for deep processing in Lao Cai such as apatite, copper.

- Lao Cai has a great potential for hydropower.

*  Agro-forestry development potential

Lao Cai’s topography is diverssed in which the high area and the low one are clearly distibuted. It is classified into the tropical monsoon climate that is divided into two regions: highland and lowland. In the highland, the average temperature is from 15°C to 20°C with sub-tropical climate which is cool in summer and cold in winter. That climate condition is very suitable for temperate crops such as apples, pear, peach, plum, rose, lily, cymbals, herbs, cold water fish such as salmon, sturgeon. These products are all special that are not available in lowland provinces, which makes an unique potential and strength of Lao Cai. In the lowland, the average temperature ranges from 23°C to 29°C, including communes along the Red River and part of Chay River. The region is characterized by tropical humid climate, which suitable for cultivating the tropical fruits such as pineapples, bananas, oranges, tangerines, especially for growing tea and tobacco... At the same time, it has favorabale conditions to raise cattle, poultry and to develop aquaculture (fish living in warm water, blue shrimp ...).

Lao Cai has potential for forestry development, the production forest land occupies 45% out of agricultural land.

* Trade potential - Border gate economy

Lao Cai has a pair of international border gates of Lao Cai and Hekou (railway and road) with 3 custom clearance points which are Lao Cai International Railway Station, Nam Thi River Crossing Bridge and Red River Crossing Bridge.  Red River Crossing Bridge connects between Ha Noi - Lao Cai Expressway (Vietnam) and Hekou - Kunming Expressway (China), which is an important bridge in the economic corridor of Kunming, Lao Cai, Hanoi, Hai Phong, also the gateway of Vietnam and other ASEAN countries and the center of the North-South Corridor in cooperation between the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) and the Southwest market of China. Lao Cai International Border Gate is the only border gate in the North of Vietnam located inside a provincial city, which is equiped with service system of an typed III urban as well as services for trade transportation, logicstics, cargo inspection, ICD port.

Since 2001, border trade fair has been organized rotatedly and annually between Lao Cai,Vietnam and Hekou district, Yunnan province, China, attracting a large number of domestic and foreign businesses.

* Tourism potential

Lao Cai has many resources with unique features to develop tourism such as the highest peak of Fansipan mountain in Indochina; several famous tourist attractions with cool weather like Bac Ha, Sa Pa, ancient mysterious rocks, national or world ranked historical sites, diversed culture of 25 ethnic groups with the typical culture of writing, costumes, housing styles, culinary and spiritual culture... Lao Cai is a regional tourism center in the Northwestern mountainous region and also the border gate province, bordered by Yunnan, a potential tourism province of China. This is one of favorable conditions for Lao Cai to develop its tourism industry. Lao Cai has been endowed with many advantages from geography and tourism resources that contributes to developing many types of tourism such as cultural tourism, resort tourism, ecotourism, sightseeing tours, sports tourism, science research tourism./.

(Data on total forest area and land extracted from the statistics provided by the Provincial Department of Statistics recorded by 1st January 2015)


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